BRM Reviews the 5/15/2015 Impact

[Big Red Machine]

Tonight’s episode of Impact is a hardcore-themed show called Hardcore War. This would be just two weeks after they did a hardcore-themed episode of Impact called Hardcore Justice.

OPENING SGMENT- Kurt puts over Melendez and introduces his team for tonight, which is himself, Melendez, and The Rising. This was a little circle-jerky but not bad. It also planted some (not so subtle) seeds for an Angle vs. Drew title match.
Kurt says that the BDC is “a cancer” which really doesn’t make any sense because their numbers haven’t grown and no one else has adopted or been influenced by their mentality (to contrast this, see what I have tried to do with the Wyatt Family in my fantasy booking, with Bray saying things that plant seeds in people’s minds that lead them to turning heel, like with the Prime Time Players).
Then Eric Young came out and claimed to still be the #1 contender. You know what’d be nice? If we could get some sort of official word from someone in charge about things like this.

Kurt apparently agrees that EY deserves a rematch and he wants a match with no outside interference… so of course he chooses an I Quit match, in which outside interference is completely legal. Did he not learn from Ken Anderson’s mistake last week?
EY introduces his teammates, who are the BDC… who are only three guys, not four, so who is Eric’s other teammate? The BDC jump the babyfaces from behind and we get a short, lame brawl until Lashley comes out and spears EY. Then Kurt introduces Lashley as the final member of his team. Huh? When they said it would be a ten man tag team match, I assumed they meant it would be five-on-five, not six-on-four!

REBEL & BROOK vs. THE DOLL HOUSE (w/Taryn Terrell)- 0.75/10
Doll House now have a Courtney Love song as their entrance theme. It doesn’t do anywhere near as a good a job of getting across their creepy vibe. Good job using those connections of yours, Corgan. If this guy is a musician and doesn’t understand how an entrance theme is supposed to set the tone for the wrestler, then I have no faith in his ability to understand any other part of the business.
Rebel tried to use Christie Hemme’s old Flying Firecrotch Guillotine, exept Rebel’s a brunette so I guess it’d be a… Dirt-crotch Guillotine?
After the match Taryn cut a promo telling us she’s been f*cking with Gail’s family.

BDC & EY BACKSTAGE- oh goody. More dissension between the heels. Because that’s always a good thing when it won’t lead to a babyface turn. MVP tells us Homicide won’t be here (after being asked by Low Ki, and then having the question very rudely repeated to him no less than two seconds later by first Kenny King and then EY), so EY tells us that he has a crazy friend he can get to come team with them. If this is Sam Shaw, I will put my fist through a wall.

Oh look. The Top five is back. Here are the current rankings:
1. Eric Young (yes, the guy who just lost a world title match is somehow STILL #1)
2. EC III
3. Drew Galloway
4. Mr. Anderson
5. MVP

The reason the top five is back is so Josh Matthews can ask Mike Tenay how it is possible that EC III is not number one… and he’s got a good f*cking point. How the hell does someone go un-pinned and un-submitted for over a year and a half and NEVER get a world heavyweight title shot out of it?
Tenay (oh yeah, he’s back for this week) tells Josh that his logic is completely sound… but rather than answer Josh’s question, he calls Josh out for being a flip-flopper because last week Josh called EC III’s victory of Anderson “hollow.”
Josh later asked Tenay how he could justify EY still being #1. Tenay said it was because of “everything EY has accomplished in spite of that loss.” Yeah… I’m calling bullsh*t on that. By that logic a former multi-time world champion like Lashley or Roode should ALWAYS be #1.

ETHAN CARTER III PROMO- Okay. The “campaign” deal was funny once, but randomly throwing government terms out there in your promo is just idiotic. It doesn’t come off as a good promo so much as it comes off as “looks which words Ethan remembers from his civics lessons in grade-school.
Anderson came out and goaded Tyrus into fighting him by repeatedly calling him a “bitch,” which was surprisingly never once censored.

KEN ANDERSON vs. TYRUS (w/Ethan Carter III)- 2.75/10
Josh turned heel for this match just because. Also, the set-up for this match was Anderson making a challenge that if he beat Tyrus, he’d get a one-on-one match with Ethan. Ethan declined the challenge. Anderson goaded Tyrus into accept a match with him right now anyway… and yet despite Ethan declining the challenge, the stipulations of that challenge were still somehow official? What sense does that make?
OH MY G-D WHAT THE F*CK WAS THE POINT OF THAT OBNOXIOUS SCREECHING?! It’s sh*t like that that makes me completely despise Anderson. He is one of the worst babyfaces I have ever seen. He’s such an annoying piece of sh*t. He’s a combination of the worst aspects of a dickhead teenager and the worst aspects of a six year-old with no self-control whatsoever.


MAGNUS PROMO- PERFECT! Just utterly perfect for what it needed to be.

ABYSS vs. MAGNUS- good for what it was, I guess.
Wait… what? WHY THE F*CK IS THERE A CHARCOAL BBQ AT RINGSIDE?!
It takes all three Revolution Lackeys to beat Magnus up.

FIRST MATCH IN A BEST OF FIVE SERIES TO CROWN NEW TNA WORLD TAG TEAM CHAMPIONS: The Wolves vs. Bobby Roode and Austin Aries- 6.5/10
I refuse to call Roode and Aries the “Dirty Heels” because that name is f*cking stupid (and even stupider now that they are babyfaces). The match was good, but I wasn’t happy with Roode and Aries’ using heel tactics like the fake tag.

THE RISING BACKSTAGE- Kurt’s team is finalized: It will be Kurt, Lashley, Melendez, Drew, & Micah. Kurt says it is one of the best teams he’s ever been on. That made me howl with laughter.

PILLOW TALK WITH THE DOLLHOUSE- our new top heels are acting like stereotypical middle-school girls at a sleep-over. Taryn says she is going to wear a sexy outfit or Gail’s husband tonight and tells the camera “this is not for you To: .” Then she announces that she is going to go out to the ring and “show the whole world” her outfit. HOW THE F*CK DO YOU POSSIBLY WRITE THAT WITHOUT REALIZING HOW STUPID IT IS!

JAMES STORM YELLS AT HIS CREW- apparently he didn’t want them to attack Magnus.

TARYN PROMO & SEGMENT WITH GAIL KIM- very good.
She shows pictures of herself hanging out with Gail Kim’s stepdaughters. I guess they don’t love Gail enough to watch her compete on TV, because if they did, they’d know that Taryn is evil. Aside from that, I thought this whole thing was pretty good, but it would have worked just as well without this whole “Dollhouse” silliness.
Also, Taryn is really hot.

JESSE GODDERZ vs. ROBBIE E.- no rating. Decent segment.
It’s been so long since they did the breakup angle that I had completely forgotten that it had happened.
Jesse loses three straight times, then snaps and beats Robbie up. Props to Josh for saying that Jesse will almost certainly be fined for assaulting an official.

KEN ANDERSON PROMO- great. THIS is how you build up a bit of mystery well.

TEN MAN TEAM GAUNTLET WEAPON-OF-CHOICE-MATCH-THING: Team EY vs. Team Angle- 7.75/10
Low Ki comes out to the ring with a steel pipe, and it is only now that they first mention two important facts: 1) that this is a gauntlet match and not a regular tag team match, and 2) that each participant can bring a weapon of their own choosing to use. THOSE ARE SOME PRETTY F*CKING IMPORTANT DETAILS TO LEAVE OUT!
The heels’ mystery partner is Bram. That’s… kind of underwhelming. Other than that, though, this was surprisingly great.
POST-MATCH ANGLE- terrible. EY pulls Melendez’s prosthetic leg off, hits Kurt with it, then chokes him with it. I absolutely HATE angles like this. It looks stupid and comes off way too close to being in bad taste.

A bad first half of the show, but a GREAT second half (maybe a second two thirds).